Hukuru Miskiiy (Male, Maldives)
Hukuru Miskiiy locates in the central area of Male with government office quarter, cemetery of saint Abu al Barakaath Yusuf, former Presidential Palace Mulee-Aage.
It was constructed in 1656 at the time of Sultan Ibrahim Iskandhar 1. It was the oldest architecture in Male and had been used as the supreme Friday Mosque for a long time.
The mosque is disposed for the west on northeastern part of the site and, the minaret with cylinder form is on this side and the cemetery with small temples and small shrines stretches over the mosque. Those architectures except minaret are composed of the outside wall of coral stone and the upper part of wood including teak, sandalwood and redwood, but only the roof substituted waterproof sheet or galvanized steel thin plates for the traditional material.
The coral stone wall abundant of ornament including Arabic writings and patterns are elaborated so exquisitely that it would be far from an impression of coral stone for us, and its white and smooth surface reminds of marble. Its delicacy and beauty is a miracle in Male where the architecture losses the standard.
This Mosque has no dome that rises high into the sky or steeple minaret unlike usual Islamic Mosque. The feature with low eaves and gentle pitch roof is similar to Japanese traditional architecture. It may be a basic form in the climate that it rains heavily in the same way and the typhoon or monsoon attacks in the same way.
The new Mosques constructed in Male had a usual Islamic style and the size was large, while, some old mosques on the street corner had similar design to Hukuru Miskiiy and the size was small. Compared with both, I thought that a traditional outlook on the architecture, the religion and the scale that connected with regional culture or climate was changing and moving.
In the cemetery are the tombs with projection and the tombs with semicircle form. The former is that for man and the latter is that for women.
Transportation
Transportation : 15 minutes by ferry from Male airport island
to Male island.
Link
Accommodations
References
地球の歩き方「モルディブ」（ダイヤモンド・ビッグ社、2005）
東京都統計年鑑（東京都、2005）
Hello! Maldives(QP Publications Private Limited, 2007)
Wikipedia
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2007.10 Photos in English version, and photos and text in Japanese version
Update
2018.01 Change of photos and English text
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